12 heading for 24

There's lots of good medical news today, but the clearest sign that Tim is getting truly well is the reappearance of want. He wants things.

He wants to eat, and soon. Specifically, he wants lamb, roast lamb. With a fluffy baked potato and squash and spinach. He's starving to death, and beige liquid being tubed from nose to stomach isn't doing it.

He wants the nose tube fixed; it's annoying. He wants his hair washed. He wants to watch Channel 4, for the 60-minutes (or 20/20 or 40-80 or whatever) report on unnamed graves in California. (His friend Rick, head of "Advocating Change Together", whose birthday it is today, and who's also in the hospital right now with bone infections from pressure sores, recently won a campaign to get the State of Minnesota to acknowledge its responsibility to place named markers on the numbered graves of generations of people with disabilities who died in institutions.)

He hasn't wanted much in the last 21 days, except to breathe and not to be in too much pain. The return of want is a return to our all-too-human, all-too-normal state. Hallelujah! And on Ash Wednesday, no less. I think we will be acutely aware this lenten season of our brief, knife-edge mortality.

The clinical news is this. The antibiotics were discontinued yesterday (Tue., 2/8). He hasn't had a fever since; temps mostly in the 97-98s. He has no sign of infection, including clostridium difficile, a common hospital-acquired bacterial infection. Dr. Pulmonology didn't order a chest x-ray today because all the other signs were so good.

He's been off the vent for 12 hours now (since 9:00 AM) and he's going for 24 hours off. He may come home not with a vent, but just with oxygen to use as needed. His weaning is going very well.

Tomorrow they'll try deflating the cuff on his trach tube and adding a Passy-Muir valve that will allow him to swallow food and liquids, and TALK! And he'll talk, no doubt, about what he wants. It'll be great.

Heading toward the weekend, and heading toward home by Monday...probably...if all goes well etc., etc., (add your own disclaimer).

That's the good news today. Good night from St. Paul.

p.s. If you're baffled about or interested in trachs, here's an interesting site: Tracheotomy History. And here's an informative one: Laryngeal and Tracheal Stents. And here's a whole video about the Passy-Muir valve.